The organizers for this year’s men’s World Cup are facing a lot of controversy for their greenwashing techniques, claiming to be carbon neutral when the fact of the matter is they have created an incredible amount of pollution. The World Cup was claimed to be a “fully carbon neutral event”, which is a premature and unworkable claim considering that carbon footprint can only take place after the event. While the carbon footprint of 64 soccer matches played over a single month’s time might appear trifling, compared with the enormous climate challenge we collectively face, FIFA’s slippery stance symbolizes the all-too-common misleading practices that many organizations, companies and governments use to hoodwink people into thinking they are addressing climate change while instead doing little.
The tournament’s matches will be staged in eight stadiums, only one of which predates the run-up to the World Cup. One of the new venues is called Stadium 974 because it was constructed with 974 shipping containers—will be disassembled for reuse after the mega event, a process that carries its own carbon load. The organization also claims that the stadiums will continue to be used by developing legacy uses for all the stadiums. But it’s hard to believe claims that the event will be used regularly in the years to come—even if they are slightly downsized afterward. After all, Qatari soccer culture is relatively undeveloped. Even soccer-mad countries such as Russia, Brazil and South Africa—hosts of the previous three men’s World Cups—have been left with a herd of white-elephant stadiums.
In addition to the carbon cost of the stadiums, Qatar expects to see a whopping 1,300 daily flights to and from the country during the World Cup. But that’s not the only source of airplane emissions. The grass seeds to give rise to the tournament’s pristine pitches have been flown in from North America on climate-controlled planes. And these fields won’t water themselves. The groundskeepers who maintain the eight stadium pitches, as well as the 136 practice fields, douse each field with 10,000 liters of desalinated water every day in the winter. In the summer the pitches require a whopping 50,000 liters each. Not to mention the outdoor air conditioning that has been implemented into each stadium to cool the fans and the players. As stated by TIME magazine,
“All air conditioning is terrible for the environment. Planet-warming hydrofluorocarbon gasses can leak into the atmosphere as the coolant escapes AC units when they reach the end of their life. Increased air conditioning use can also put a strain on electricity grids, often powered by fossil fuel energy; together with electric fans, air conditioning accounts for 10% of global electricity use.”
FIFAs suitability claims are highly reliant on carbon-offset schemes. Is it even possible to stage a carbon-neutral sports mega event? The ever expanding size of these events likely puts net-zero emissions out of reach. So why did FIFA feel the need to greenwash the event rather than being transparent about the issue. Greenwashing blunts the reality that sports mega events are shape-shifting vehicles for global capital that leave indelible marks on cities, ecosystems and our collective future.
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